


to be with you

by ThisJoyAndI



Category: Brooklyn (2015)
Genre: F/M, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 08:54:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13337769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisJoyAndI/pseuds/ThisJoyAndI
Summary: (just to be with you)'Eilis often longs that there might be two of her – one to live in Ireland and keep her mother company, and the other to live out her life in America, with her husband.'





	to be with you

**Author's Note:**

> Seriously, can someone hook me up with a Tony Fiorello because I'm still obsessed.

The noon sun is bright and warm on her skin. As per usual there is a throng of people on the street, but all she registers is the sight of her husband, as handsome as the day he bid her farewell. Tony had waved so very eagerly as her boat to Ireland departed, content in the knowledge that soon enough she would be home and back with him. She’d promised as such, hadn’t she? Vowed, and Eilis Lacey – _Eilis Fiorello_ – is not the sort of woman who breaks a vow.

She may have returned later than either of them expected, but she came back. She loves him, and she wants to be with him. Isn’t that what truly matters?

Tony wraps his arms tight around her, her wedding band proudly displayed on her ring finger for all to see, and for Eilis, her husband’s embrace truly feels like coming home.

 

\---

 

It isn’t until she’s been working in the city as a bookkeeper for well on two years that the houses on Long Island are finally finished. They had decided on four, and the structures have been worked on in every spare moment Tony and his brothers could manage to get, which accounts for the expanse of time they’ve taken to be constructed. She doesn’t mind the wait, not really, for whilst Tony and her may have rushed into marriage, she will not rush the rest of their lives together.

She tells him all about what happened when she returned home to Ireland, perhaps a week or so after she rushes from immigration to see him. She tells him all about Jim, her heart in her throat as she does so. Tony listens to her confession in silence, much like her mother’s Father Patrick would, and when she tells him that although nothing happened, perhaps a part of her wanted it to, her husband merely sweeps the hair away from her eyes tenderly and presses a kiss to her forehead. He says nothing, for it seems he cannot summon the words, but the arm looped tight around her waist reassures her nonetheless. There is nothing to be said, not really. She has returned to Brooklyn, to Tony, because this is where her home is now. Tony is her home, she is more aware of this every day, and she shall never think to leave him again.

He builds her a quaint house, letting her have the pick of the four and grinning when she chooses the structure furthest to the right, the one painted a cheery yellow and with a small porch at both the front and back of the house. “We built those especially for you,” her husband confesses, Eilis pressed tight to his side. “So we can have somewhere cool to eat in the summer, you know, when it gets too hot inside. I know you still aren’t used to the weather,” he laughs, kissing her temple fondly as she scrunches her nose up at him.

“And the kids can still play outside even if it’s raining,” she replies, her words marking the second mention she’s ever made towards the possibility of children.

Her words make Tony’s beam stretch even wider, if that is at all possible. She knows he wants kids. That desire has never been unknown to her, and somewhere within in their two years of marriage Eilis has discovered that a part of herself wants them too, eyeing the children in strollers on the street with something close to longing. But the timing has never been quite right, what with Tony trying to juggle both his job and the construction of these houses, and with Eilis graduating and settling into her new, demanding role as a bookkeeper. And they are so very young still, their love so new… and perhaps somewhat selfishly, she has not wished to share her husband with anyone, not just yet.

But perhaps now, with a house of their very own and Eilis confident that the question of leave would be met with a cheery smile, perhaps now their timing is perfect.

Tony’s mother would delight in a horde of grandchildren - a little girl specifically, seeing as she has been surrounded by boys for decades. Her hints referring to their creation have become nothing close to subtle in the last few months. Even Eilis’ mother has begun to ponder on the question of grandchildren in her neatly written letters. I would like to see them grow up, her mother writes, and so Eilis has decided that when the time comes she shall send for her. Her mother may not want to leave Ireland, but surely she can come to meet her first grandchild. And if that visit never ends, well isn’t that for the better? She shall have someone aside from Tony’s family to help with the baby, and her mother won’t be alone, an entire ocean away. Eilis often longs that there might be two of her – one to live in Ireland and keep her mother company, and the other to live out her life in America, with her husband.

\----

“What will we call them?” she asks late one night, curled up next to her husband. Her right hand is spread across his bare chest, feeling the heat radiate from his skin.  “Our children, I mean.” Tony is nearly asleep, eyes closed and breathing steady, but her question rouses him. She cannot see him, but she can picture the bewilderment crossing his face.

“Something Italian if we have a boy,” he mumbles, voice scratchy. Eilis rolls her eyes, but knows better than to question her new family’s traditions. And besides, surely there will be more than one boy. The second one she thinks, that one shall have an Irish name – perhaps her father’s?

Tony continues, unaware of her silent decision. She’s the one who will be carrying these children, after all, and she knows that when it comes time she’ll be able to twist Tony’s arm in a way only she and his mother can. “And I was thinking, I don’t know, maybe Rose for a girl? It doesn’t have to be her first name, not if you think that’s disrespectful to your sister, and I don’t mean that we should try, that we’re trying to replace your sister,” he trails off, swallowing. When he speaks again, his voice is soft, almost reverent. “I just thought it sounded nice. Rose Fiorello.”

“Rose Fiorello,” Eilis repeats, trying the name out in the darkness of their bedroom. Her heart pangs at the sound, for Rose should be here with them. Her sister should be married with her own children, should be content with her own husband, instead of lying lonely six feet underground. Eilis shakes her head softly, trying to clear her mind, for these thoughts should not be thought in the darkness of night, when there is no sunshine and cheer to combat them. She will not let such thoughts fester, not when she knows Rose would never want that.

Her melancholy thoughts never come to fruition however, for their first child is a boy. Tony swings her round and round their kitchen when she tells him her news, Eilis clinging tightly to him, uncaring that despite meticulously washing Tony still faintly smells of sewage. Her pregnancy is quite easy, Eilis constantly running a hand over her ever-growing bump and Tony’s mother ensuring that all of her cravings are met. She finishes up at the firm when she’s around seven and a half months gone, happy enough to stay home and occupy her last few weeks of waiting by knitting baby clothes and reading books. For days it is just her and the baby, Eilis waking up hours after Tony has departed for work and contently lounging in bed until her stomach grumbles and she has to succumb to their child’s hunger.

As easy as her pregnancy is though, her labour is hard. Tony’s mother had told her of how painful it could, but experiencing it is something else. The doctor almost doesn’t allow it, but Tony demands to be in the delivery room, and she clutches at him desperately. Despite Tony being by her side for the hours it takes to deliver their child into the world, despite his tight grip on her hand and the cool washcloth on her forehead, Eilis still longs for her mother, longs for Rose, longs for the pain to be over and for her suffering to end. She screams until her throat is sore, but somehow, suddenly, all the pain and all of the anguish rushes away when she hears her baby’s first cry.

“A boy," the doctor pronounces, and she thinks that nothing else will ever match the joy in Tony’s eyes at that very moment.

“A boy, a boy, a boy,” she murmurs, as they pass him to her, as Tony’s fingers tenderly caress their son’s flushed skin. His eyes are wide and so very blue, and although she’s read that is the case for most newborns, she hopes that her son shall keep her eyes. The rest of him looks exactly like Tony, the baby blessed with a thick head of dark hair. When she looks up at Tony, unable to help the tears pooling in her eyes, her husband beams with pride, his own eyes watery with unshed emotion. He does not leave her side until his mother knocks on the door and demands to know if Eilis has delivered yet, Tony quickly enveloped in his family’s arms and screams of joy.

“They’re quite noisy, aren’t they?” Eilis murmurs to her son, pressing a kiss to his forehead. He wails half-heartedly in return, and she beams, soothing him with a gentle caress. “But they’re wonderful, I promise.” She carried him inside her for nine months, and now he is here, an unusual but entirely welcome weight in her arms.

He is the final piece of her new life, and when Tony, red-cheeked and still grinning from the Fiorello’s impromptu celebration, asks her if she’d like to call him Saverio, she agrees without hesitation.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact - according to some random website, Saverio is an Italian male name that means 'new home'. I thought it was fitting.


End file.
